James Clifford, “On Collecting Art and Culture”, in 'The Predicament of Culture: Twentieth-Century Ethnography, Literature, and Art'.

James Clifford, “On Collecting Art and Culture”, in The Predicament of Culture: Twentieth-Century Ethnography, Literature, and Art, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1998, pp. 215-251.

James Clifford has been one of the most original, influential, and controversial scholars working in anthropology over the last 30 years . ‘His work has challenged the conventions of anthropology by offering new ways to understand the forces and interactions that shape cultures.’

Within the essay ‘On collecting art and culture’ the most interesting idea for me was that ‘what you collect defines you.’ I am interested in the personal significance an object has to a collector. Collecting is basically defined as the gathering of objects. For me, and many others, the objects we collect link to memories of the past, especially childhood. Collecting objects that have a past life gives the owner a sense of having an important piece of history this is discussed by Susan M Pearce who states that ‘individual objects accumulate meaning as time passes’ she talks about how objects are both active and passive and how meaning develops as an interactive process between thing and viewer.

With Antiquities the objects value is dependent on who once owned the item and the story behind the piece as much as the objects known value. Clifford talks about this on page 222 old objects have a sense of “depth” by their historically minded collectors.’ This is further discussed on page 231 he states that phenomena are ‘rescued’ to prevent decay or loss of a persons memory with that object, ‘The collection contains what “deserves” to be remembered, and treasured” personal experience with an object becomes important, only objects that signify memories that are of significance to the collector are cherished. The New Zealand Herald section ‘Canvas’ asks a person each week ‘What would you save if you house was on fire?’ the most common item something passed down from a family member. This example shows how we link memory through objects therefore Clifford is indeed correct in saying that gathering possessions helps a sense of identity and experience through objects.


http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/information/biography/abcde/clifford_james.html accessed 18th July 20009

ibid

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/collecting accessed 17th July

Pearce, Susan, ed, et al. Interpreting Objects and Collections. London, Routledge Publishing, 1994 pp.19-23

Clifford, James. On Collecting Art and Culture. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1998, pp. 218